Critics who label them slovenly misfits, troublemakers and drug addicts, have not bothered to take the time to engage them.

Nor do those critics understand that social movements are never neat and tidy or easy to decipher — not at the beginning.

Even in the midst of an unprecedented police presence in lower Manhattan, with dozens of checkpoints set up and cops demanding IDs for anyone getting near the Financial District, new supporters of the protest kept finding their way to Zuccotti.

There was Joel Crooms, for example, a 58-year-old retired teacher from Montclair, N.J.

“I remember the moral outrage my generation felt during Vietnam,” Crooms said as he stood in the park. “These kids are finally forcing us to face the growing corruption in our government and society. I just felt I had to be here to back them up.”

via Occupy Wall Street protests aren’t over by a long shot – NY Daily News.